4. On the Waterfront
The Strangers' Home, Limehouse

The handsome and commodious building in West India Dock road, Limehouse, belonging to the Strangers' Home for Asiatics, Africans, and South Sea Islanders, has lately been, repaired and enlarged, so as to complete its original design.

The institution was founded in 1856, under the patronage of the Prince Consort, and established at a cost of £16,000, one third of which was contributed by native Indian princes, gentlemen, or merchant, and a great part of the remainder by English gentlemen connected with the government of India, or by English merchants and shipowners concerned in the Indian trade.

It offers, not gratis, but for ten or fourteen shillings a week, the comforts of a well-managed lodging and boarding house to sailors, servants, and others from the Eastern world, with perfect safety against the fraud, robbery, and ill-treatment to which they would otherwise be exposed in London.

More than 6000 person, from India, China, East and West Africa, the Malayan peninsula and islands, and those of the South Pacific, have been sheltered in this institution.

Of these 1124 were casuals, and 1149 were destitute creatures, taken off the streets, or from hospitals, gaols, and workhouses.